Numerical analysis of the coupled thermal-stress strength of the active grooved feed zone in an innovative extruder for plastics

Abstract

The article presents a new concept of active grooved feed zone in an extruder for granular polymer plastics. The innovation of this concept lies in the use of a properly shaped sleeve with a set of grooves and a closing element moved by the actuator so that it is possible to change the length of the grooves during the extrusion process. Numerical calculations using finite element method are presented. They were a temperature-displacement coupled analysis, which was a geometrically and physically nonlinear issue. The obtained results of calculations confirmed the sufficient strength of the structure of that extruder zone. The professional ABAQUS® software was used for the computations.